


Lullaby

by heavenandhighwater



Category: SK8 the Infinity (Anime)
Genre: Adam is a dick, Angst, Anxiety, Anxiety Disorder, Cherry's lullaby, Did I mention we hate Adam?, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Jealous Joe, Joe's mom is an angel, M/M, Mild injury depiction, Soft Cherry, Spoilers, episode 9 tings, fuck the palm trees, soft joe
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-09
Updated: 2021-03-09
Packaged: 2021-03-15 10:21:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,879
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29931981
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/heavenandhighwater/pseuds/heavenandhighwater
Summary: Cherry's anxiety has always been a problem for him and only one thing soothes him, a lullaby. Specifically, Joe's childhood lullaby.Mainly focuses on teenage Cherry, Joe and Adam as well as the events of episode nine and the teaser.
Relationships: Nanjo Kojiro | Joe/Sakurayashiki Kaoru | Cherry Blossom
Comments: 2
Kudos: 128





	Lullaby

**Author's Note:**

> So I was peeing when I headcannoned that Joe knows about Cherry's lullaby and then the idea kind of snowballed from there.
> 
> I just want to note that all depictions of anxiety are based on my own personal experiences and how I felt that Cherry would deal with it. Obviously, I have no canonical material to go off so I've done my best to make it fit but it was quite hard because he has a generally calm demeanour.

Anxiety had always been a problem for Cherry. It started when he was in middle school, his long pink hair and delicate features made him an easy target for bullying. 

He’d always liked pretty thing and grew increasingly fond of the way his mother compared the colour of his hair to the flower that would later become his pseudo name. Other kids weren’t as keen.

It started with smaller things, grouping him with the girls in conversations, using female pronouns when they thought he couldn’t hear and vandalising his things with crude words and images.

Then it progressed and soon the harsh words were replaced with physical aggression and the kids who once drew on his things were instead hiding his clothes during gym and replacing them with the standard girl uniform.

More times than Cherry cared to admit to, he’d walk home in a skirt in favour of going home with nothing on. Each time he had to, photos were taken and slurs were shouted.

So, when high school rolled around, Cherry left his district, opting to instead head to a school that was a decent train ride away.

That was where he met Joe, began skating and found that being surrounded by the sound of clattering boards as the wind moved rapidly through his hair was more than enough to calm the storm that often raged in him. Away from the childhood buddies and with Joe next to him, Cherry got more experimental with his appearance.

He let his hair grow out past his shoulders and squeezed his fists tight as he let Joe pierce multiple rings through his ears, before later letting a professional pierce his lip.

For a while, things were good. It was just Cherry and Joe, bickering petulantly whilst the rest of their friends pulled them apart and to the warehouse where’d they race and make up. Within the first year of high school, Cherry’s more severe anxiety episodes had dissipated and whenever he felt the steady build of panic in his chest, he’d tug Joe along with him down the steepest hill he could find.

When Adam came along, Cherry appreciated the challenge. He was something new and different for Cherry to try out and after they’d hashed it out a couple of times, he became a more permanent part of their group. 

It worked in Cherry’s favour. Now he had two people he felt at ease around who were willing to help calm the bubbling nerves and the sudden swing in mood from stable to breaking down. 

“I still don’t like him.” Joe had huffed as they skated their way to his home one Friday.

“Of course, you don’t, he is better at skating than you.”

“Watch it Pinky.”

“Come on, you’re so nice to his face then when we leave, you’re all grumbles.”

“I’m civil to his face. I just think he’s sneaky. I don’t know what he’s sneaking about at but I know he’s doing it.”

“I can guarantee that the second you beat him, just once, you’ll stop saying all of this.”

“Maybe.”

Cherry didn’t see it himself. Sure, Adam was a little secretive but there were no malicious intentions behind it – at least that’s what he thought. Adam was charming, and sweet and had saved his ass from hitting the concrete more than once. Cherry felt safe with him around.

That’s why it was only natural that Cherry found himself blushing whenever Adam caught him by the waist or spared him a second glance. When he finally took his hood down in front of them and stated that they were special to him, the feelings had hit Cherry like a truck and it had all become clear to him.

After that, he began subconsciously living for Adam. Everything he did was to gain his attention and approval. He worked harder at his part-time job, to get more money, to but a nicer board, to train harder. Adam complimented his hair styled one way so he styled it that way every day even though it made his arms ache and meant he had to get up earlier.

All the effort was going unnoticed, it just that it was only being noticed by Joe. He watched as Cherry tortured himself for the slightest grain of approval from Adam. It pissed him off, Cherry looked fine the way he did before, great even, and he wasn’t working himself to the bone to get better at an alarming rate. 

He was so tired all the time that it became more and more like he’d lost his love for skateboarding. Sure, he was getting better and had even surpassed Joe but the drive behind it all had changed into something artificial.

On top of that, Cherry’s anxiety began creeping back in. He was no longer skating to keep it at bay but instead skating until his anxiety built up. The physical and mental pressure he placed on himself made him a bundle of nerves near constantly and his coping mechanisms were crumbling away.

Cherry felt that it was worth it though. He was leaving everyone behind in the dust and heading full speed towards Adam, convinced that his approval would fix everything. 

“You look exhausted again.” Joe complained, entering the classroom and taking a seat by Cherry.

“Yeah, Adam and I were practising until almost midnight then I had to skate home so I was pretty knackered.”

“Why are you going at it so hard?”

“I’ve got to close that gap between me and Adam. I need him to see how hard I’m trying.”

“You know he’s been doing this since he was a kid, I don’t get why you’re so desperate to catch up.”

“Because he’s amazing you idiot. Have you seen the way he’s built? And he dominates everyone like it’s second nature.”

Joe was so annoyed at that point, he passed up the opportunity to joke about Cherry’s want to be dominated. “Right, I forgot, the sun shines out of his ass.”

“Don’t be so crude you monkey! You don’t actually always have to be so jealous.” Cherry huffed, crossing his arms.

“It’s not jealousy, I just don’t get the big deal!” Joe snapped back.

“The _big deal_ is that he could skate circles around you and your two brain cells and you hate that.”

“Don’t be a prick Kaoru.”

They sat in silence after that, snapping occasional insults at each other and mumbling under their breath in distaste.

Cherry continued to blindly follow and support Adam and eventually Joe gave up fighting it. He still skated with them, knowing he’d be too worried about Cherry if he stopped but he kept a watchful eye on all their interactions. 

Adam became more and more daring with the tricks he wanted to try and where he attempted skating, always dragging Cherry along behind him, who was less than willing to participate. He always did though, throwing himself off every unstable structure and steep hill, only a few paces behind the object of his affection.

He continued to work tirelessly alongside the increasingly dangerous skating and soon his anxiety returned, more severe than it had been before. The only difference was that what used to calm the nerves was now the root cause of it. Cherry was stuck in an endless loop having backed himself into a corner, trapped under Adam’s gaze.

One evening, when the sky was turning deep shades of navy and inching closer towards black, the group was preparing to head home. Cherry had been out with Adam and Joe as usual, with a few juniors from school joining them after a couple of hours.

As they began grabbing their things and headed for the doors to the warehouse, Adam spoke up.

“Cherry!”

Most of them stopped, some carrying on out the warehouse and towards home but Joe refused to leave Cherry’s side and some of the juniors were intrigued to see what would happen.

“A race.” Adam declared. “Except it’s a rail-slide and it’s down those.”

Adam extended his finger out to point at a busted-up set of stairs that connected the upper level of the warehouse to the concrete floor. They were steep, tiring just to walk up, dangerous to skate down.

They creaked with the tiniest bit of what and half of some of the steps were missing completely. Plus, the handrails were rusted and split in some places. Nobody dared hold onto them when walking, sliding down them should have been out of the question.

“O-okay.” Cherry nodded, heading away from the door.

Joe caught a glimpse of his hands, the way his first curled and uncurled, nails digging into trembling palms.

“No!” Joe shouted up, grabbing ahold of Cherry’s wrist.

He watched as Cherry visibly calmed, the shaking subsiding a little and a deep breath escaping him.

“No?” Adam jabbed.

“No. He’s not doing that, it’s not safe. He’ll get hurt if he goes down those things.”

“So? Where’s the fun without a little danger.”

“You’re supposed to be his friend, you should care about whether he walks out of here alive or not.”

“Fine. You!” Adam demanded, pointing at one of the juniors. “You’ll do it.”

The junior in question was a snotty shit, too much confidence and no skill to back it up. Adam knew what he was doing picking that kid.

“I wouldn’t do that kid; you won’t walk away from it in one piece.” Joe warned.

The kid scoffed. “I’m not a pussy like you.”

“That’s the spirit!” Adam cheered. “Now, I’m a gentleman so please; chose your rail.”

The kid chose the one on the far right and Adam the centre one. Everyone else stood at the bottom, a little out of the way, their breathing caught in their chests. 

Joe still had a firm grip on Cherry’s wrist and he felt that he was still shaking so he slid his hand down to intertwine their hands instead. Cherry sent him a cautious and nauseated look, silently telling Joe that he was grateful but he felt no better.

In fact, all Cherry felt was guilt. The kid was taking his place and he knew he should have intervened and insisted on doing it himself but he knew what going down those rails meant. It was selfish but he’d rather that kid than him.

Adam and the junior did a couple of laps of the upper deck gaining the momentum to propel themselves onto the rails. Once they had enough speed and were both heading for the respective rails, the countdown began.

Time stood still as they mounted the rails. Adam was smooth sailing from the start but the far-right rail began collapsing the second the impact had finished ringing through it. The junior maintained his balance and composure for a moment, staying ahead of the collapsing rail.

Still, there was only so much he could do and once the support rail hallway down the stairs collapsed, the whole thing went at once. The kid was gone, flying off the side and hitting the ground with a sickening crunch.

He didn’t die but he never skated again, hell he never walked again.

Cherry had to be carried away by Joe, a nervous wreck, filled to the brim with guilt and overflowing with tears. Joe scooped him up from where he collapsed on the floor and pulled him away from there without so much as a second glance to Adam who was already escaping before any blame could be placed on him.

Joe took Cherry to his house, where his mother stopped them in the doorway and pulled Cherry from his arms. She led him to the living room where she cradled him against her side of the couch.

She had always been like a second mom to Cherry and dealing with his anxiety wasn’t something new for her but calming him had only become harder when skating stopped helping. 

“What happened, Kojiro.”

“Some kid wanted to try a rail-slide down this really old rail and we told him not to but he did anyway. It was bad, mom; he was really hurt.”

Her eyes were wide and she shook her head in disbelief. She knew how dangerous skateboarding could be but her boys were always good to stay away from all that. She also knew how sensitive Cherry could be to violence and injuries, he was soft natured and put a high value on human life. 

She did what she could, rocking the pink teen softly and using calming words. When she felt like nothing else would work, she began humming a simple tune. Soon it morphed into the lullaby she’d used to soothe Joe to sleep as a toddler. The words fell from her lips in a soft-spoken whisper and encased around Cherry like a warm hug.

Eventually, he calmed, his breathing returned to normal and he uncurled from Joe’s mom to lean against her shoulder instead.

After a while, she stood up, offering to fix them some food and call Cherry’s family and inform them of where he was.

“You good?” Joe asked, sitting carefully on the couch beside him.

“Yeah, fine.” Cherry sniffled, wiping his eyes with his knuckles and sitting up straighter.

Joe knew that come morning, Cherry’s pride would force him to behave like nothing had happened and it would never be mentioned again. Still, for the remainder of the night, he spoke softly around Cherry, letting him get every insulting jab in he could and only throwing a few back so he wouldn’t feel pitied.

As predicted, come morning, Cherry went back to usual and never mentioned the previous night again. Try as he might, he couldn’t distance himself completely from him, remaining glued to his side until he finally left, heading to America to study abroad.

Once he was gone, Cherry was noticeably shaken by everything. He became quieter, more composed. Soon out of high school, the piercings were removed one by one and the hair dropped to a low ponytail over his left shoulder.

They never spoke of that night or what happened to their junior, in fact, Joe was sure Cherry had blocked the memory from his mind entirely.

What Joe didn’t know was that the night plagued Cherry’s mind often. He had nightmares, random flashbacks, random triggers that all evoked an anxiety attack. For the first few, Cherry rode them out, suffering the ache in his chest for hours before it finally subsided.

Then, when the attacks became too frequent, Cherry tried focusing on the lullaby Joe’s mom had sung to him. At first, he would just focus on the memory and utilise it to ground himself in the moment. From there, it progressed and he would make himself sing it softly, beginning to end, no matter how stuttered and awful it came out at times.

Quickly, it became a ritual. Every time he felt that familiar bubbling and surfacing of anxiety, Cherry would turn his mind to the one thing that worked: the lullaby.

When he was older and he had Carla, he programmed her to know the lullaby and to be able to recite it to calm him before the attack started or to coach him through the ones where it was too difficult to do it himself.

Before he left for the tournament, he debated listening to it just in case but Joe pounding on the door changed his mind and he swiftly left.

He regretted the decision the second his card was pulled. He needed his lullaby but at S, surrounded by all the people that held him on an impossibly high pedestal, it wasn’t feasible.

Joe noticed his unease, the subtle signs only a trained eye could pick up on. Things like the way he clenched his jaw, the tight way he curled his hands into a fist until his nails dug in and the slight tremor travelling down his left side.

He knew Cherry had a ritual for his anxiety, one he’s worked on for years and couldn’t conduct in public so he did the next best thing. He called Cherry’s name, running up to his side. There were a lot of things he wanted to say, to admit but they would only pile in his mind than ease his anxiety.

So, he waited until Cherry through the first punch, dubbing him a “loser gorilla”. There it was, the green light to verbally abuse him and allow it to serve as a distraction and a friendly reminder that Joe was there by his side.

When Adam suddenly turned on the last stretch before the abandoned factory, Joe braced himself. Everyone could see Cherry pulling ahead. No one was more aware of the battle he’d undergone to get there than Joe and Adam. Cherry was supposed to finally garner his respect, grasp his attention if only for just a second.

When the board collided with his face, Joe heard the gasps from the crowd and say Miya and Shadow avert their eyes away. Joe's stayed locked with the screen, eyebrows furrowing as a quiet rage bubbled in him.

Cherry was unmoving on the ground as the camera’s broadcasted Adam’s spiel about Langa being his Eve but Joe had switched off to it. He was busy grasping a shaken Miya and Shadow, darting in the direction of his car.

By the time they reached Cherry, Adam was long gone. His hair laid splayed out beneath him; Carla battered a few feet away. Cherry’s eyes drooped open and shoot, his eyes darting madly for something to focus on. His breathing was laboured and a trickled of blood was travelling down his left temple.

An ambulance couldn’t get into S, it would be dangerous for both the ambulance crew and the future of it, they’d be running the risk of getting it shut down. 

Joe saw Miya’s pale complexion and wide eyes and asked him to grab Carla. Miya obliged doing a quick scan around for any bits that could have flown off. Meanwhile, Shadow helped Joe carefully lift Cherry into the back of the car, Joe squeezing in next to him.

They dropped Miya off at the top of S, promising to keep him updated and then they were off. Cherry’s consciousness was spotty, each time he awoke he was aware of where he was and who he was but would drop back out quickly.

As they grew closer to the hospital, the adrenaline seemed to disappear from Cherry and suddenly he was very aware of what had happened and the pain he was in. 

His breathing became erratic, deep breaths that seemed to hold no oxygen pulled at his lungs and tears pricked the corners of his eyes. His mask was long gone but he reached up to his face with his good arm and grabbed at thin air like it was still there.

Joe felt an ache in his heart and he smoothed down the pink hair that had become uncharacteristically messy. He spoke softly, asked Cherry to focus on his voice, name things he could see, smell and feel but Cherry’s thinking was too fogged and his vision to blurred for it to be of any help.

Then Joe thought back to a night, years previous, one he’d almost let slip from his memory. He shot Shadow a warning look in the mirror, which told him to never breathe a word of what he was about to do to anyone.

And then he began.

Just like his mother had and just like Cherry had all those nights unbeknownst to him, Joe began singing the lullaby. His voice wasn’t suited for it and he couldn’t quite remember the words but the tune was there.

Like a sedative, the lullaby worked to level out Cherry’s breathing and push him into the depths of sleep once more.

When Cherry did wake, he was alone in a hospital bed with a pounding head and a fond memory. He wasn’t entirely convinced that it wasn’t a dream until a nurse came in humming the tune, before later explaining she’d heard a man with green hair humming it a few times to him.

Never one to let his talents go to waste, Cherry shamelessly flirted with the nurse and gushed how she was perfectly Joe’s type until she helped him escape.

Once situated outside Joe’s restaurant, Cherry felt a little stupid but it was too late to turn back so in he went.

Joe teased him about looking like a mummy, about his incredible invisibility skills and how it was rude to disrupt a man whilst he was sad drinking. Then silence fell upon the pair when they’d both exhausted all insults and potential teasing material.

“How’d you know?” Cherry asked, admiring Joe over the counter.

“Know what?”

“About the lullaby, that it helps me.”

“Oh,” Joe mouthed, cheeks pinking ever so slightly. “I didn’t. It was the only thing I could think to do and it kept working.”

Then it was Cherry’s turn to blush. He’d just exposed himself to the one person who’d terrorise him about it the most.

“I’m sure mom would be flattered.”

“Well, she helped me then and it helps me now.”

“Don’t I help?” Joe teased. 

“Yes.” Cherry muttered.

“Hmmm? What was that, I didn’t quite catch it?”

“I said yes, you dumb gorilla. Now would you please go get that bottle of wine, I’m figuratively dying over here.”

“Fine, fine.” Joe chuckled, before leaning across the counter, impossibly close to Cherry’s face as he frequently was. “One thing first.”

Lips brushed against each other with feather softness, countless years of friendship and unrecognised feelings transferred in the one quick zap of contact.

“I’m glad you’re okay Kaoru.”

Joe disappeared into the back, hunting for a bottle of wine and Cherry collapsed against the surface of the counter. He buried his face in his arms and screamed internally, trying to figure out why that great big idiot had done such a thing.

But then he thought about how much he liked it and how he wouldn’t mind if it happened again. His mind wandered slightly, fantasising about different scenarios in which he got to do that all the time.

He sighed and turned his head to lean on his cheek instead of his aching forehead. As the thoughts of Joe, stupid, simple, gorgeous Joe, swirled his head, Cherry let his heavy eyelids drop close and his mind switch of temporarily as the grip as slumber took him.

“Is white okay?” Joe asked, re-entering the room.

He turned and saw Cherry collapsed against the counter asleep. Sighing, Joe sat next to him and poured two glasses quietly explaining why Adam was so different.

He’d never outwardly admit it to Cherry but he was the better skater, he had Adam on the ropes and it simply came down to the fact that he had people and Adam didn’t.

Joe smiled fondly down at Cherry, admiring his growth and strength all the while knowing that the second, he awoke and saw the size of his drink, he’d bitch at Joe about how tight he was. But for once, Joe knew he wouldn’t mind because at least he was there to nag.

“We’re not alone. Right, Kaoru?”

**Author's Note:**

> So, this was really fun to write and I'm quite proud of how quickly I managed to create this. Hope you enjoyed it! :)


End file.
